


and I said I wouldn't get sucked in (this is the last time)

by olandesevolante



Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Unresolved Romantic Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-22
Updated: 2020-12-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:13:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28242966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/olandesevolante/pseuds/olandesevolante
Summary: Charles tries not to question about tomorrow or the next year, about his teammates, past and present and future. Everything, everyone is negotiable. He tries to believe the lies he tells himself about not caring about the people around him, hiding behind an"it's how this sport goes” when he perfectly knows that, for some of the people he thinks of, it's not anymore only the sport that binds him to them.
Relationships: Charles Leclerc/Sebastian Vettel
Comments: 4
Kudos: 37





	and I said I wouldn't get sucked in (this is the last time)

**Author's Note:**

> \- it's fiction so I'll pretend Sebastian had a reason to go to Italy after Abu Dhabi;  
> \- (Christmas atmosphere what?);  
> \- title comes from "This is the last time" by The Nationals;  
> \- English isn't my first language, I apologize for every mistake I made.

_Sure, I can accept that we're going nowhere,  
but one last time let's go there._

_(Paolo Nutini, Last Request)_

There are 288,41 kilometres between Monaco and Maranello, 345,85 between Monaco and Switzerland, and Charles doesn't know how many there are between Monaco and Silverstone.

Distance is nothing and everything, depending on the feelings involved. For Charles, the distance between Monaco and Maranello is everything, is what makes his blood scream all the time and always makes him feel a sense of loss when he's away from racing. The distance between Monaco and Switzerland has meant, for the last two years, something he has never been able to put a name on, but still something that has filled him with warmth and expectations. The distance between Monaco and Silverstone should mean nothing, so much that Charles doesn't even know how much it is, never bothered looking it up and telling to himself it's because he doesn't care, when he perfectly knows it's because he doesn't want to make it real.

\-----

There's confetti falling everywhere, confetti already on the floor everywhere. Charles looks at them, his mouth curved into a sad smile that luckily the masks covers, they're everywhere but they're not for them. Next to him, Sebastian is frowning, and in another moment maybe Charles would have asked him if it was because of the futility of all these confetti that someone will have to pick up and clean away. Between them, the jokes have always flowed easily, but right now there's not a them anymore – it's Abu Dhabi, they're watching Max being crowned winner of the race, surrounded by the two Mercedes driver who are drowning him with the fake champagne, and since the end of the race, him and Sebastian aren't basically teammates anymore.

Confetti are flying around Sebastian's head too and for a moment Charles can see him, younger, happier than he has ever witnessed in person. Charles reaches over and brushes away the coloured paper that stuck in his hair, shaking Sebastian from the reverie he was in. Sebastian makes a face at him.

«I'm sorry.» The dream Sebastian was in was surely more pleasurable than this reality where they have to look other drivers celebrating while they can count on the fingers of one hand the podiums gained this season.

But Sebastian shoots him a sympathetic smile. «Your time will come too.»

«Don't say it.»

«I know it will.»

Charles looks up at the confetti, the lights hitting them while they fly around, shining. For some seconds he allows himself to dream of those confetti being for him and believe that Sebastian is right (Seb is always right, always proved so in these two years together, whether they'd been playing some of the silly PR game videos they had to shoot or about the car or about some of his reckless actions on the grid. He can only hope Sebastian is right now too.)

Back in the hotel, after the end of the small party they managed to throw despite the regulations, Charles doesn't even pretend to go to his own room, instead following Sebastian without speaking, without asking. Sebastian keeps the door open for him to enter the room and locks it behind them without saying a word.

That night, Charles marks his favourite spots on Sebastian's body, starting from his hands, the thumb and then the palm and then again the wrist, looking him in the eyes after every kiss, a hungry look to which Sebastian can only surrender. The same hungry look he gave him after Brazil, instead of the apologies Sebastian was expecting from his teammate for his stupid shunt and that made his blood boil with desire. It should have been the alarm bell that Charles was someone he should have stayed very far from, someone able to act in a way he didn't expect, and he wasn't talking about the grid.

Charles kisses his collarbones through the red Ferrari shirt he's wearing, the shoulder, up on the neck, stops on his chin where the stubble is scratchy, a reminder of where they are, of what they are doing. Sebastian remembers Charles bringing him a cup of coffee in bed in his apartment in Monaco, hair sticking in every direction and clad only in his boxer briefs, a soft smile playing on his lips and looking at him with that genuinely sincere expression of him. The coffee had ended up forgotten on the night stand, the two of them too lost in each other to remember about it.

Charles kisses his nose, and Sebastian smiles at the gentleness of it. That's something he has been pleased to discover – behind the layers of goofiness and clumsiness there's an exquisite young man of an undeniable tenderness. Even when they had discussions and collisions while racing, there hasn't been one day outside of them in which they have been rough to the other when they have stopped driving.

Charles kisses his sternum, down his belly, follows the trail of hair going down and kisses the prominent bones of his hips. Sebastian's head is at the first time they met after quarantine, Charles pulling him in the second they were finally finally left alone, in a demanding and messy kiss full of teeth and tongue and biting, overwhelming him with his intensity. Charles was demanding like never before, and he obliged, pulling him with himself on the bed, rolling them over so that he could pin him down on the bed, never breaking the kiss. That had been the only time where they had been careless enough for Sebastian to leave a bruise on his neck, under his jaw.

Later, after Charles has finished his litany over Sebastian's body, after they have pushed out of the other last energies left in such a long day, they stay there, limbs entangled in the sheets, the breathing of Charles steady and rhythmic against Sebastian's neck.

\-----

Since when he has started racing, Charles has never dreamt of home, too preoccupied with getting the best result, always. He has always been friendly to everyone - or almost everyone, and if something went wrong with someone, Charles doesn't think it was his fault because it wasn't him who wanted to pick fights, simply because fights require energy and all his energies had to be concentrated on racing.

People leave. People leaving him, that's nothing new for Charles. It's never been about doing things but in making things count, and that's what he does. He trains, he races, he tries always to be the best. He tries not to question about tomorrow or the next year, about his teammates, past and present and future. Everything, everyone is negotiable. He tries to believe the lies he tells himself about not caring about the people around him, hiding behind an _“it's how this sport goes”_ when he perfectly knows that, for some of the people he thinks of, it's not anymore only the sport that binds him to them.

Some days Charles doesn't know where home is, and that's fine. Home has become this blurred sensation, neither here or there and at the same time both here and there. Home is Monaco and is Maranello too, it's wherever his supporters cheer for him or cry with him. It has never been painful, for him, this feeling of not belonging to anyone or anywhere.

\-----

It's only a couple of days later that Sebastian's phone beeps, when he is in Italy too, to finally sell the house he rented these last years and definitely leave this country and anything that links him with Ferrari.

_don't leave without coming to me for lunch_

Sebastian chews on his thumbnail. It's been a long time since he's stopped biting his nails, and he always scolds Charles for doing so while they listen to engineers talking after the races. He wonders if Carlos will do the same with Charles, or if he will catch himself saying it again in the next season to Lance too, before typing his answer.

_I promised you, I didn't forget. I am old, but I am not that old._

He even adds a winking emoji that he knows will make Charles laugh, before unlocking his car and starting it.

There was no need for Charles to send him the address, Sebastian has already been at the apartment he rented in Maranello, but the Monégasque has done it all the same. Sebastian pulls into the empty driveway – this is the last time he's going to drive a Ferrari given to him by the factory, it sounds fitting to use it to see Charles. He kills the engine and sends a text to Charles before stepping down and entering the building, heading straight to the floor he remembers being the right one.

It's sparsely furnished place, like only a house on rent for the less possible days to live there for its owner who is used to living in Monaco can be. Nonetheless, it's _Charles'_ and even with the little days that he actually lives here, he manages to have his properties scattered everywhere, too many pairs of sunglasses (Sebastian counted four) on various horizontal surfaces, some old copies of Gazzetta stacked under the coffee table, a fluffy blanket not folded on the sofa. Charles looks at Sebastian looking at the mess in the living room with a bit of apprehension, fidgeting with the hem of his shirt as a kid who knows his bedroom is a complete disaster.

«Your girlfriend is a saint, for putting up with your mess during lockdown.»

Charles is wearing his dreamy expression when he answers. «Uhm. What do you think?»

«You're able to make this not like an anonymous hotel.» Charles decides to take this as a compliment.

«Are you hungry? I am just starting now on the lunch, I wasn't sure what time you'd finish, so...»

Sebastian gives him an amused smile. «Are you cooking?»

«Yeah, why not?» Charles sticks his hands in the pocket of the jeans, cheeks reddened. «I thought I could make you a little surprise.»

«Well, it definitely is. So, what are you making?»

«Knowing me, a mess» Charles grins at his own words, Sebastian mirrors him. «You know I can actually cook, yes?»

«Yes. Your famous white pasta.»

«I said that I can cook, not that I am a good cook.»

«Again, your girlfriend is a saint.»

«Yeah, she is.» Charles seems lost in some memory for some seconds, before he comes back to Sebastian.«So, I wanted to make you _pasta alla carbonara_ , I know you like it, and everyone told me it's not that difficult to make...» He scratches his neck while saying it and stumbles towards the end of the sentence, as if embarrassed by his own words. Charles wanted to make him his favourite dish because this is Charles with a trademark on it, he has probably embarrassed himself enough asking every Italian in their box to get the best recipe advice so that he could prepare this for him.

«Come on, let me help you.» Sebastian is already rolling his sleeves up his arms.

«No, it's your surprise and -»

«And I really appreciate it. But you already have eggs smeared on your overpriced t-shirt and if you don't put soap on that now, you can basically throw it away.»

«...oh.» Only Charles would wear Gucci in a kitchen, anyway.

«Don't worry your pretty head around it. Just go and get changed, and I'll get on with the cooking while you set the table.» The fact that in the end it's Sebastian that ends up cooking his own surprise is another thing that is definitely screaming _Charles_.

Charles instead sets the table, trying unsuccessfully to hide some of the stuff that had been lying on it for literally years, as a copy of Sportweek from October 2018 says. Sebastian has teased him and they kept the bantering on while they finished their own work, a kind of conversation easily made because dumb humour is high on the list of the things they both like, somewhere with playing with dogs and having their hair petted in the morning.

The problem is when the gigantic elephant in the room will be impossible to ignore, which, in this case, happens when Charles is loading the dishwasher and Sebastian notices the bottle of wine on the counter, a red, rich, expensive local wine. It's a name that he remembers having said once, when sitting down with Charles and Riccardo the evening before the race at Monza. Charles must have remembered the name. It feels like something is stuck in Sebastian's throat at the thought of Charles going through his memories to remember the name he said, or maybe he has seen it somewhere and a light must have flicked on in his brain and reminded him the conversation.

He nods at the bottle with his head before he can really think about it too much. «So, what should we call this occasion?»

«Well. To Lewis' championship?»

Sebastian snorts. «Got anything more festive?»

«Not really.» Charles tries to say it casually, but the air changes between them, the atmosphere of easiness that had permeated their lunch condensing in a melancholic one. Charles avoids his eyes now, fidgeting with the corkscrew in his hands. «To your next adventure in a Bond movie?»

«Charles.»

«No, really, I am happy for you. You deserve this occasion, you know that.»

« _Charles_.» Sebastian's voice is tempered with a kindness that threatens to break Charles in two. «You don't need to say anything intended for cameras, it's only me and you here.»

«I mean what I say, also in front of cameras.» The bottle of wine clinks too loud when Charles settles it back on the counter.

«But there's no need to pretend now this is the only thing you think.»

«I am not pretending.» He mutters, but his voice breaks on the last syllable and he turns around. _Fuck_ , it's all that he can think. That's not how he planned this to go, he wanted to make a nice little present for Sebastian, away from the prying eyes of cameras and of their team too, something only for them, something nice to tell him goodbye. The last thing he wanted was to look like this petulant child that can't overcome the end of a contract.

Sebastian grabs his hand, his callous fingers dance on bruised knuckles, and grips it stronger when Charles tries to break free from him.

«I'm fine.» The lie is crystal clear in Sebastian's eyes, Charles doesn't even try to hide it, not when he knows there is no point in it, not when he has never been able to hide his thoughts from Sebastian.

«Tell me what you need.» It's the fact that he doesn't ask what Charles wants, because he knows what he wants is going to be impossible to give him. Charles doesn't say a word, but he tucks his head in the crook of his neck, breathing in where the scent of Sebastian's skin is stronger, let it flood in his body and fill him up. Sebastian closes his arms around him, sustaining his weight when Charles leans on him.

It would be nice, now, if he could make a scene, movie-like, blaming Sebastian for leaving him behind, throwing in some constructed sentences like _I wasn't enough to make you stay_ , but he can't. There's no one and nothing to blame here. If this was a movie, now Sebastian would kiss him hard, leaving him no space to think of anything that isn't the undying love he feels for the German, Sebastian would hold his head between his hands and confess him his feelings maybe, saying he doesn't want this to be the end of everything they are, saying that they are going to make this work, that just because he won't be driving for Ferrari it doesn't mean they're not going to see each other again every weekend. Charles would tell him that he can't go, that he needs him here.

The reality, though, is that it is over, whatever it is they started. Sebastian isn't going to make him any promise, easy words to make this easier. There's nothing to make easier, anyway.

The truth is, they're teammates and they're not supposed to be friends. They should be at each other's throat to get the best result out of the car, they have been at each other's throat quite some times, and they haven't become friends. This non written rule, they have respected it. They are something deeper, harder to understand, more dangerous than friends. He doesn't love Sebastian like he loved the girlfriends he's had, he doesn't love Sebastian like he loves his friends. Charles doesn't have a word in French, Italian or English for it – maybe he could ask Sebastian if there is something in German, if he just knew how to phrase this feeling.

Sebastian turns his head just enough to press a kiss on his temple. «Do you want to move this to the sofa?»

Charles moves away enough to look at him in the eyes and shakes his head. He cradles Sebastian's head in his hands, gently, as if afraid to break him. The kiss that follows is chaste, just a brush of lips, and still it makes their stomach ache with the intensity behind it – it's meaningful, full of the untold words and love declarations that will never see the light.

«How long are you staying?»

«All the time you'll need me to.» It's a lie in which they both need to believe, so Charles doesn't question it and Sebastian doesn't add other meaningless words. Meaning is everything that counts, but at the moment, and never again in the future, it's not something he can offer to Charles. Not anymore.

\-----

Later, probably, he'll lie in his bed with the phone in the hands, and will admit to himself, with an underlying sense of bitterness, that Sebastian felt like home. It's in the way Sebastian always seemed to have packed a double of the things Charles forgets the most – toothbrush, earphones, gloves, not necessarily in this order. It's not about love, it's about the sense of familiarity that Sebastian has given to him in the last two years, like knowing always that there would have been something certain, no matter what, no matter where.

There are 288,41 kilometres between Monaco and Maranello, 345,85 between Monaco and Switzerland, he doesn't know how many there are between Monaco and Silverstone. He doesn't know and he'll never know, and it's so easy to pretend this is fine that Charles can almost believe it really is.


End file.
